Saturday, July 30, 2016

In "Du's Handbook of Classical Chinese Grammar," the following sentence and translation is given:

敎(교)其(기)子(자)以(이)齊(제)語(어)Taught his son the language of Qí.

"Du's Handbook" has explained that 以 (이) can be used as a direct object marker, which seems to be how it was translated here. 齊(제) was an ancient kingdom of China during the Spring and Autumn Period. And 語 (어) means "language." Therefore, the sentence seems to make sense, but couldn't the sentence also be translated as follows?

敎(교)其(기)子(자)以(이)齊(제)語(어)

Taught (敎) his (其) son (子) using (以) the Qí (齊) language (語).

以 (이) can mean "to use," "to take," "with," "in order to," and a few other things, so I am suspicious of 以 being used simply as "a marker."

I do not know the story from which the sentence was taken, but if the person had wanted to express the meaning "Taught his son the Qí language" instead of "Taught his son using the Qí language", I think he would have written it one of the following two ways:

The first sentence simply uses the standard Chinese "indirect object"-then-"direct object" order to clarify the direct object. The second sentence clarifies and emphasizes the direct object by moving it to the front of the sentence and using 以 with its meaning of "to take," which in Korean is 가지다. Therefore, in Korean, the second sentence would translate as follows: "제어를 가지고 (以齊語) 그의 아들에게 가르쳤다 (敎其子)." The only problem with the second sentence is that the meaning could still be unclear since 以 could also be translated as "to use," which means the sentence could be translated as "Used (以) the Qí (齊) language (語) to teach (敎) his (其) son (子)."

The context of the story would probably clarify the meaning of the above sentence, but since I do not know the story, I can only guess. Finally, the original sentence could also be translated as follows:

Taught (敎) his (其) son (子) to use (以) the Qí (齊) language (語).

The above sentence would effectively have the same meaning as the original sentence in "Du's Handbook."

Friday, July 29, 2016

Two or three weeks ago I posted HERE about 두견 (杜鵑), a word used to refer to both "an azalea" and "a cuckoo." Another name for the cuckoo bird is 불여귀 (不如歸), which literally means "not (不) like (如) returning (歸)," but which should be translated as "not as good as returning." Now you might be thinking, "What?" Well, it seems the Chinese pronunciation of 불여귀 sounds similar to the cry of a cuckoo bird, which is how the bird supposedly got its name.

According to one story in Chinese mythology, there was an ancient Chinese kingdom known as Shu (蜀 - 촉) with a ruler named "Emperor Wang" (望帝 - 망제). One day Emperor Wang was walking along a river and saw what looked like a dead body floating in the water, but when he approached the body, the person he believed to be dead suddenly and surprisingly opened his eyes. The man said he was from a district called Xing-zhōu (刑州- 형주) and that he had come out to the river and accidently fallen into the water, after which he floated all the way down the river to where he was found. He said his name was Bie-líng 鱉靈 (벌령), which means "Turtle Spirit."

Emperor Ming felt that Bie-líng must be a good man since Heaven had spared his life, so the emperor gave the man a house and made him one of his counselors. Later, however, Bie-ling deposed the emperor and banished him to another country. The emperor was so heartbroken and homesick that he eventually cried himself to death, after which he transformed into, you guessed it, a cuckoo. After Emperor Wang's death, people said they saw a cuckoo, which they believed to be the spirit of the emperor, flying around crying in such a way that it sounded like he was crying the Chinese for "It's not as good as returning," which can also be translated as "It's better to return."

There is, at least, one other story of how Emperor Wang became a cuckoo, but the story I just paraphrased came from THIS Korean Web page. You can imagine that poets and songwriters might come up with a few ways to use the double meaning of 불여귀 (不如歸) in the material they write.

In July 2011, I wrote THIS SHORT POST about a young woman named Alyssa Donovan, who had just won second place in a Korean speech contest hosted by the U.S. National Association for Korean Schools. At the time, she was a sophomore in a high school in Maine, where she graduated Salutatorian in 2013. (See high school bio HERE.) I wrote the post after reading an article about her accomplishment in the English-language version of "The Donga Ilbo" entitled "American teen places 2nd in Korean speech contest." I even found a video of her Korean speech on YouTube, which I have posted below.

Anyway, tonight I accidently came across my old 2011 post and began to wonder what happened to Alyssa Donovan, so I did some Google searches and found out that she got a Bachelor's degree in "Korean for Professionals" in a program called "Korean Language Flagship" at the University of Hawaii at Manoa, the same school from which I received my BA in Korean Language and Literature way back in 1982. However, when I went to the University of Hawaii, I could barely speak Korean, so Alyssa had a big advantage over me. Moreover, Alyssa's program included a year of studying aboard at Korea University in Seoul, South Korea, where she also worked as an intern at the King Sejong Institute Foundation. Since Alyssa graduated high school in 2013, to have already received a Bachelor's degree in just three years means she used her time well at the University of Hawaii, probably taking advantage of the summer courses offered there.

So what is Alyssa doing now? Well, judging from a kind of online resume HERE, she is still in South Korea, where she seems to be trying to work, at least part time, as a Korean-English translator for what looks like very reasonable rates. Hopefully, she is doing more than just translating because, from my experience, translators work too hard for the money they earn. Of course, now they have a variety of online dictionaries and software that can help them.

In 2011, Alyssa was already very good in Korean, so I can only imagine how good she is now, especially being as motivated as she is. If I were Alyssa, I would try to get a job using my language skills working for the US government, if she has not already, because it is a lot easier than working as a freelance translator. Or she might make a great Korean language teacher. At any rate, whatever Alyssa decides to do, I wish her the best of luck.

Here is Alyssa, as a high school sophomore, giving her prize-winning, Korean-language speech in 2011:

Thursday, July 28, 2016

“This house has been empty for a long while, nobody has dared
enter for ten years.”

In the above sentence, you may notice that 向 (향) was translated as "a long while," but I had never before seen 向 translated as "a long while," so I looked up 향하다 in a Korean dictionary and found it can mean "to face towards," "to go towards," or "to tend towards," all of which have the common meaning of "towards," but there was no meaning of "a long while." And when I looked up 向 in a Chinese character dictionary, I found that it can also mean "previously" or "recently," which is translated as 지난 번 in my Korean Hanja dictionary. When I saw that, I started wondering where Koreans got the meaning "지난 번."

The only Korean word I could think of that had 向 (향) in it and was also a reference to "time" was 향후 (向後), which means "hereafter" or "from now on." Then I realized that if there is a 향후 (向後), there might also be a 향전 (向前) since 후 (after) and 전 (before) are often paired together as opposites. Sure enough, I found 향전 (向前) in my Korean dictionary with the definition of "지난 번."

So, here is my more literal translation of the Chinese sentence at the beginning of this post:

此(차)宅(택)向(향)空(공), 十(십)年(년)無(무)敢(감)入(입)者(자)

“This (此) house (宅) previously
(向) was empty (空). [For] ten (十) years (年)
no one dared to enter (無敢入者).”

敢入 (감입) means “dared (敢) to enter (入).” If you add 者 (자) to 敢入, you create a relative clause that means “one who
dared to enter (敢入者)"
since 者 means “one who.” Then by adding “無 (무)” to the front of 敢入者, you create a sentence that means “there were none who
dared to enter (無敢入者)”
or "no one dared to enter" since 無can mean "there were none," "none," or simply "no."

The sentence seems to have come from THIS STORY, which has a rough English translation.

Wednesday, July 27, 2016

Today I came across the Chinese character 攀 (반), which means "to climb (by pulling oneself up)." I learned that the Korean meaning is 더위잡다, which made me wonder what "더위" means. I already knew that 더위 means "heat" or "heatstroke," and that 더위먹다 or 더위들다 means "to be affected by heatstroke," but the 더위 in 더위잡다 seems to have nothing to do with heat.

Since 잡다 means "to hold" or "to grip" and 더위잡다 means "to climb by pulling oneself up," I am wondering if 더위 could be a merger of the two words "더 (more)" and "위 (above)." If that is the case, then 더위잡다 would mean "더 위(를) 잡다" ("grab hold higher"), which would be a necessary thing to do if one were climbing a tree or ladder. After all, if someone were climbing, one would have to "grab hold higher" to "pull oneself up" higher. Think about it! What would a Korean father say to his son if he were teaching him how to climb a tree or ladder? "더 위 잡아!"

Monday, July 25, 2016

Today I came across the Chinese character 窺 (규), which means "to peer at," "to peep," or "to look at secretly." The Korean meaning is 엿보다, 훔쳐보다, or 살펴보다. It can also mean 꾀하다, which means "to plot," "to plan," or "to scheme." Upon seeing 엿보다, which means to "look at furtively or secretly," I suddenly became curious to know the original meaning of the prefix "엿-." A Korean dictionary defines "엿-" as 몰래, meaning "secretly," but that was something I already knew. 엿듣다, for example, means "to secretly listen to." Also, the supposedly vulgar expression 엿 먹이다 is defined as 슬쩍 걸려주거나 속이다, which means "to secretly harm or trick [someone]" No, what I wanted to know was how 엿- came to mean "secretly."

If you look up 엿 in a dictionary, the first definition to pop up is "a glutinous rice jelly taffy," which seems to have no correlation with the meaning "secretly." As a prefix, "엿-" can also mean "six," as in 엿새, "six days," which, again, seems to have no correlation with the meaning "secretly." However, I also found that 엿 was an old word for 여우 (fox), which is known to be "cunning" or "crafty," and that implies secrecy or furtiveness. Therefore, I am simply wondering if 엿보다 originally meant "to watch like a fox," and if 엿듣다 meant "to listen like a fox"? Again, I do not know; I am just wondering.

UPDATE: Wow! I guess I was right. Immediately after posting the above, I decided to do a Google search of "엿보다." (Yes, I often do things backwards.) Anyway, I found that in a book entitled "우리말 뉘앙스 사전," by 박영수, the 엿 in 엿보다 means "여시," which was an old name for 여우 (fox). It also says that the word 여시 is still used in some areas of Korea. Here is how the book described 엿보다:

If anyone is interested, and I am a little interested, you can buy the ebook version of "우리말 뉘앙스 사전" for $7.39 at THIS LINK. Believe me! I did not post this to try to sell this book. I just feel I need to supply a link since I quoted from the book.

Sunday, July 24, 2016

好 (호) can mean either "good" or "to like," and 事 (사) can mean "thing," "matter," "affair" or "to serve" or "to work." When 好 is used as an adjective, 好事 means "good (好) thing (事)" or "good action," which translates into Korean as "좋은 (好) 일 (事) ." When 好 is used as a verb, 好事 (호사) literally means "to like (好) [others'] affairs (事)," which translates into English as "to be meddlesome." Therefore, 好事者 (호사자) literally means "one who likes [others's] affairs," which translates into English as "a busybody" or "a meddling or prying person." The 者 translates as "one who."

Saturday, July 16, 2016

I am out on my patio reading about quantifiers and determiners when I see a roly-poly crawling toward me. Then suddenly I want to learn about roly-polies, which are also called "pill millipedes" or "pill bugs." I assume they are called "pill bugs" because, when one is disturbed, it rolls up into a little ball that looks like a pill. By the way, do not eat a pill bug, because, according to Wikipedia, they exude a noxious liquid that can be both caustic and toxic. In other words, they do not taste good.

Anyway, there are only two orders of roly-poly still living, Glomeris marginata and Armadillidium vugare, but, believe it or not, all together there are about 550 species: about 450 of the order Glomeris marginata and about 100 of the order of Armadillidium vugare. I am pretty sure the roly-poly I saw was of the order Glomeris marginata, but I was unable to determine the species, or sex. By the way, Wikipedia does not explain how they reproduce.

Roly-polies are "detrivorous," which means they eat decomposing plant matter, so unless you are saving your decomposing plant matter, I see no reason to consider them as pests. So, let's just live and let live.

By the way, I came out onto the patio to try to figure out a better way to explain the combination 之於 (지어) to learners of Classical Chinese. I was hoping to explain it in terms of the Korean language, but, unfortunately, I got distracted by the adverb 盡 (진) in one of the example sentences, which made me think of the difference between 모두 and 모든.

The Korean word 모두 is an adverb meaning "in all cases," but many Koreans misuse it as a noun. 모든, on the other hand, means "all" and is listed as a 관사, which generally translates as "an article." But I had known "all" to be a "quantifier," so I looked it up to discover it is listed as a "determiner." I was reading about the difference between a quantifier and a determiner when I saw the roly-poly.

The Korean word for pill bug is 쥐며느리, which literally translates as "mouse's (쥐) daughter-in-law (며느리)." It is also called 공벌레, which means "ball (공) bug (벌레)."

Sunday, July 10, 2016

The following is my translation of a 1906 entry from the Korean text Maecheon Yarok (梅泉野錄 - 매천야록), which was written by poet, scholar, and activist Hwang Hyeon (黃玹 - 황현), whose pen name was Maecheon (梅泉 - 매천). Maecheon Yarok seems to have been the private "field (野) journal (錄)" of Mr. Hwang, who used it to record news, events, and opinion from about 1864 until 1910. Actually, 野錄 seems to be an abbreviation of 野史記錄, which means "Record of Unofficial History." 野史 (야사) means "unofficial history," and 記錄 (기록) means "a record." The opposite of 野史 (야사) would be 正史 (정사), which means "official history" or "authentic history." There are many, many interesting stories in his journals, but this is one I found particularly interesting:

[In] Hamheung-bu (咸興府), there is (有) Gugak (九閣),
the place where the Highest Emperor Taejo shot arrows while riding a horse (太祖高皇帝騎射之地也).
At the relay station (站) a Japanese (倭) said (謂)
up above the castle (閣上) there is (有) a precious
(寶) gas (氣). [If you] dig (掘) into
the ground (地) twenty or so feet (數丈), there is (有) a
boulder (磐石). [When] the rock (石) was broken (破), a giant
(大) snake (蛇) flew out (飛出). [It]
was forty to fifty feet long (長四五丈) [with a girth] four or five
times bigger than that of a house’s crossbeam (大如屋梁四五倍). One Japanese (一倭)
shot (銃) [at] it (之), [but] missed (不中). Six
Japanese (六倭), simultaneiously (齊) shot (銃) and
killed (斃) it (之).

[When] it was burned (燒) outside the east gate (于東門外),
the stench (臭) was so (極) terrible (惡) a green
(靑) gas (氣) covered (冪) the whole
(一) fortress (城). [During] the night (夜) seven (七)
Japanese (倭) vomited (嘔) blood (血) and
died (死). The next day (明日) another (又一) snake
(蛇) came out through the crack in the rock (從石隙中出). [It]
was as big as (大如) [the one] from the day before (昨). [They]
shot (銃) at it (之), [but] missed (不中). It flew
around the fortress (繞城而飛) sadly (哀) crying
(鳴) throughout the night (達夜).